Ronit Shaked.
There is no glory in my injury. My knee twisted, it could have happened anywhere else, on the stairs, on the way home from work or on a walk in the park. But it happened in the Palestinian village Burin on the mountain.
We arrived early on Friday morning for a joint solidarity activity of Israelis and Palestinians activists. we came to accompany farmers who are unable to reach their land and cultivate it. Farmers who are harmed and threatened by the violent settlers from the nearby outpost. On that morning we encountered the army as we expected would happen, and as expected the army announced that the land was a closed military area. Why? Because they can.
Why? Because what is a Palestinian farmer who cannot cultivate his land as opposed to the criminal hooligans living on land that has been stolen from local Palestinians. (Regarding the illegal outpost and the private land , there is no legal dispute)
What happened on the mountain on that morning?
There were announcements, there were arguments some even substantive debate (I was present in one of them) there was nonviolent resistance, a conscious decision . The situation is clear - one side is the army, armed and protected, and in front of it are people, Palestinians and Israelis, in clear sight, with empty hands. No stones were thrown and no violent actions were taken.
The order came and with it the tear gas, the stun grenades and all sorts of other things that I did not recognize, I ran away from the shots in an attempt to escape the tear gas. The knee twisted, one bad movement, and I could not walk anymore. I stood in a burned field around me, the noise of explosions, tear gas and heaven knows what, stuck. Not to swallow, not to vomit. Mostly do not breathe. I shouted that I can not walk and within a second Doron
and Hagar caught me. Slowly and gently the three of us progress together towards the ambulance, a minute away it seems to my knee and me like eternity. The explosions continued, tear gas bullets falling around us, that's actually the story.
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Human rights activists and Palestinians descend the mountain. What made you want to keep shooting? What made you want to act inhumanely? The most moral army in the world must update software. Morality was not there. I suspect there never was, either.
On that Friday the West Bank burned again. (In this specific incident in Burin we came down the mountain with 6 wounded, 3 Israelis, me Guy and Ben who were directly injured, and 3 Palestinians-two paramedics and a journalist during the day many more were added) No one knows this because it is routine. The Israeli media will not talk about it because This does not interest Israelis.
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My knee will heal, but the Palestinians will continue to live in a reality where the beginning of a day does not mark its end. The leg will rest and I will return to activity.
The occupation will end one day, whether you like it or not. In ways of peace or war.
